I am trying to decide on a prep course--and I really need one, if only for the personal study time it will borrow from my family obligations on a semi-regular basis.

I have been out of school for a while and I need the structure and possible public humiliation of a class to commit to a schedule right now. I also need to be able to say, "No, can't do that, I have to go, I have a class." But I don't want to waste my money or time on just any old course, either.

I've ruled out Kaplan and PR, and am trying to decide between Powerscore and Testmasters. Have any of you seasoned LSAT gurus taken either of these courses? If so, any recommendations?

I have no experience with Powerscore but I used Tm for tutoring and now I teach for TM and I think that the course is really well designed. However, by far the best advice I found for mastering the LSAT was on the very informative thread where everyone who scored above a 160 (most scores were above 170) offer tips for beating the LSAT at:

That is indeed a great discussion to compare Powerscore vs. Testmasters.

I have taken Powerscore, actually both the weekend course before i took the LSAT the 1st time, and then the full length course(i didn't do so well on the first LSAT).. the second LSAT I took I went up 7 points. I found the course very useful(the full length especially) as I work full time and it was difficult to study. It was in a nice hotel with a very good instructor (law students) I went to the Boston one, my first instructor was a PHD law student at Yale who was extremely good, and the 2nd one was a recent BU grad who was getting a good big firm job. I think they require every instructor to get at least a 175 on the exam to be able to teach. The materials were good, and I've heard that Powerscore and Testmasters are the best. Powerscore was also I think cheaper than Kaplan and PR. Testmaster is basically a next generation powerscore, i think its from a group of people at powerscore who set up their own shop and stole the material ( i believe there was some sort of legal battle over their materials, thats why all their names for things are copyrighted). Anyway that was my take, but I suggest the full length course, which has 4 practice exams on saturdays, and classes twice a week for a month or so.

As a working professional it was quite good because it forced me to actually learn the material ( i found it hard to do most of the homework but I still improved drastically on my score) Also, it was from 6-10 at night, so I could go after work. Hopefully this might help in your quest to compare Powerscore vs. Testmasters.

Testmaster is basically a next generation powerscore, i think its from a group of people at powerscore who set up their own shop and stole the material ( i believe there was some sort of legal battle over their materials, thats why all their names for things are copyrighted).

It was actually the other way around. TestMasters is the original company, and powerscore is an offshoot. David Killoran (the founder of Powrscore) was a teacher for Robin Singh (the founder of TestMasters) before he set up his own company. In fact, Robin is pretty much the inventor of "real lsat questions" approach to LSAT prep. So it is kind of understandable that he goes around suing other companies (such as powerscore, the Texas Test Master, and Blueprint to name a few) for "stealing" his ideas and other issues.

Anyway, it doesn't really matter which one was an offshoot of which, and to return to the original post of choosing a prep company, I have not taken a powerscore course, but I read their bibles, and I thought that they were excellent (especially the LR bible).

TestMasters course structure is great and the homework assignments are well-organized and very helpful. Go to their website (http://www.testmasters180.com) for more information on their courses. But bear in mind that even though it does not say on their website, you get even more live instruction than mentioned. TestMasters offers many extra workshops and test reviews (at no extra charge) taught by no one other, but Robin himself. And Robin is perhaps the best LSAT taker and teacher in the world. The guy loves the test and he really cares about each of his students .

Anyway, if you could take the TM course taught by Robin then that's even better, but if not, then still any TM instructor is great, and the course is awesome, so it's worth giving some consideration.

Last edited by mmm on Sat May 05, 2007 6:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Testmaster is basically a next generation powerscore, i think its from a group of people at powerscore who set up their own shop and stole the material ( i believe there was some sort of legal battle over their materials, thats why all their names for things are copyrighted).

It was actually the other way around. TestMasters is the original company, and powerscore is an offshoot. David Killoran (the founder of Powrscore) was a teacher for Robin Singh (the founder of TestMasters) before he set up his own company. In fact, Robin is pretty much the inventor of "real lsat questions" approach to LSAT prep. So it is kind of understandable that he goes around suing other companies (such as powerscore, the Texas Test Master, and Blueprint to name a few) for "stealing" his ideas and other issues.

Anyway, it doesn't really matter which one was an offshoot of which, and to return to the original post of choosing a prep company, I have not taken a powerscore course, but I read their bibles, and I thought that they were excellent (especially the LR bible).

TestMasters course structure is great and the homework assignments are well-organized and very helpful. Go to their website (http://www.testmasters180.com) for more information on their courses. But bear in mind that even though it does not say on their website, you get even more live instruction than mentioned. TestMasters offers many extra workshops and test reviews (at no extra charge) taught by no one other, but Robin himself. And Robin is perhaps the best LSAT taker and teacher in the world. The guy loves the test and he really cares about each of his students .

Anyway, if you could take the TM course taught by Robin then that's even better, but if not, then still any TM instructor is great, and the course is awesome, so it's worth giving some consideration.

Killoran was never a teacher for TM. He was a co-founder and co-owner.